The Third Man
by oleanderhawkmoth
Summary: "During that long and racking march, it seemed to me often that we were four, not three." Injured in battle, the TARDIS falls to Earth. The Doctor meets a precocious ginger girl, only to learn that things aren't quite what they seem.


**AN: No beta reader, very little Britpicking, just me and my huge, crazy AU. Anything you recognize belongs to the BBC-the rest is my fault.**

The Third Man Factor: the reported sensation of an unseen presence such as a "spirit," "angel," or "imaginary friend" providing comfort or support.

"Who is the third who walks always beside you? When I count, there are only you and I together."

-T.S. Eliot, _The Waste Land_

* * *

The girl in the little lilac frock was small-ish and thin-ish, and crying. She sat on an overturned pail in the darkened lot, sobbing into bare knees.

Although just how she'd wound up there in her grandfather's garden allotment wasn't all together clear, it was obvious she was an independent child-there wasn't another soul in sight.

The sun set in brilliant scarlet, gold, and violet. One by one, the stars came out overhead, and still no one came for the little girl in the lilac frock.

Elsewhere, the sky is burning, spires are falling, and a planet is dying. High above the glowing, molten terrain, a ship is spinning wildly.

Time and space are warping wildly, possibilities blooming and withering in the blink of an eye. Universes are born, grow and die. And in the heart of the ship, a very human man is bleeding on the floor.

In her youth, the ship had been a real thing of beauty, with great struts and cathedral ceilings, and books from every where and every _when_ piled in the corners. Now, one of the great spidery supports lies broken, the lights turned a sullen red. The books had been shifted elsewhere.

The pilot worked his controls franticly, flipping switches, pulling levers, and occasionally giving the whole console a sharp thump. The great central groaned and heaved, straining against the weight of time as it pulsed.

As the universe tears around her, the planet below shatters. The great ship screams. The Enemy has fallen, but they hadn't escaped unscathed. She was dying alongside her sisters, her home gone.

"This is it Old Girl, one last trip. Let's make it count." The pilot flipped one last switch, and looks to his unconscious companion before collapsing.

A little girl in a little lilac frock is crying.

She's clearly had a Very Bad Day; her hair has mostly fallen out of its tail and her knees are still bleeding sluggishly. She isn't terribly old, perhaps no more than nine and no less than six, and she's already carrying the weight of the world on slim, freckled shoulders.

Like her grandfather, this is her hide away, and the best place in the world for scrumping and star watching, but she's never been here without the old man. When no one could spare the time for her, she'd packed a bag and come all on her own, but now the shadows were deep and full of monsters.

Curled up in a miserable ball, she would have missed the shooting star if she hadn't chosen just then to scrub at her grubby cheeks. It glowed brilliantly against the dark sky, the long tail hanging long past the time it should have faded.

In a fit of pique, she dismissed it as space rubbish. Another, smaller light flashed by, streaking the sky with light. And another, and another.

The girls scrunched her eyes tight and fisted her hands under her chin.

"Star light, star bright…

please, please let Daddy get better. "

Three more streaked by overhead. It was a real, proper meteor shower by the time the first bit of debris hit the ground, making a smoking hole. A toolshed stood in lonely, rusted splendor three lots over. To the girl, it was as far off and untouchable as Shangri La. Something whistled past her head. She screamed and hit her knees in the dirt, bits of singed rubbish falling all around. A bit of what looked like a tattered, steaming leather-bound book bounced off the fresh turned earth.

If she'd been a little older, or a little more scientifically minded, the girl might have wondered at that. As it was, she was too busy coming to the conclusion that she should have stayed abed this morning. The girl buried her head under her arms, the air screaming all around.

When she dared to peep over her arms again, the tool shed was gone. In its place was a great smoking hole, a bit of blue poking out.

Most of the paint was gone, and one door hung half off, windows broken, but any kid out of nursery school would have recognized it-an old fashioned police box just like the one that used to sit on her street.

The girl crept closer on kitten feet. She hadn't seen one in years; Mum said they were an eyesore, but Mum said that about a lot. The girl thought they were a pretty shade of blue. The box settled with an awful cracking sound that heralded the last of the tool shed. The door fell away, leaving the girl isolated in a beam of amber light.

She scrambled backwards, falling on her backside and finishing the fine job she'd done on her skirt. She didn't stop running til she found her schoolbag.


End file.
